SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 10 - PLAYWRIGHTS AS SCREENWRITERS 5 Films 8:00 p.m. (ET)/5:00 p.m. (PT) BAREFOOT IN THE PARK (1967) Barefoot in the Park began as a Neil Simon Broadway play in 1963. A romantic comedy about a couple of newlyweds trying to make it in New York, it was Simon's first solo effort, and it was an astounding success. Robert Redford starred as Paul Bratter in the play, and Elizabeth Ashley played his free-spirited wife Corie. When the decision was made to adapt the play to the screen, Simon wrote the screenplay himself so it would be as true to the original version as possible. Redford, who was also cast as the lead in the film, was surprised by the offer. He believed it was standard for Broadway actors to be passed up by Hollywood for the role they originally created on the stage. Still, Redford wasnÕt completely sure he wanted the role Ñ he didnÕt like to repeat himself. Fortunately, Barefoot in the Park turned out to be Redford's first commercially successful movie and the start of a great film career. Paul Bratten was actually not a favorite character of RedfordÕs. Gene Saks, the first-time director of the film, later said that Redford hated wearing a suit and tie all day. He wanted people on the set to know that he wasnÕt really like Paul, and would wear a black western hat and cowboy boots off-camera. He did enjoy making the film, however, partly due to the rapport he developed with his leading lady. Jane Fonda was chosen to play Corie in the film version of Barefoot in the Park (1967). At the time she was fighting a losing battle against being typecast: She was promoted as a sexpot in Europe in films like Roger Vadim's remake of La Ronde (1964), and as the girl next door in U.S. movies such as Any Wednesday (1966). Luckily, the role in this film would allow her to play off both screen images, with some comedy thrown into the mix. Noted by many was the great onscreen chemistry Fonda shared with Redford. The two leads became close friends during the filming, sharing a mutual interest in liberal politics. "Bob and I", Fonda later said, "We share the same causes." The film focuses on conventionality versus unconventionality. Corie, the unconventional woman, is constantly trying to get Paul to loosen up a little, to go "barefoot in the park." Charles Boyer stars as Victor Velasco, the kooky neighbor of the Brattens who must go through their apartment in order to enter his own. Mildred Natwick, who appeared in the stage version with Redford, stars as Mrs. Banks, CorieÕs mother, who gets a second chance at romance, thanks to her daughter's matchmaking efforts. Natwick's delightful performance was nominated for a Best Supporting Actress Oscar¨ for her performance in this film. The film's popularity later inspired a TV series with an all-black cast. Director: Gene Saks Producer: Joseph H. Hazen Screenplay: Neil Simon Cinematographer: Joseph LaShelle Editing: William A. Lyon Music: Neal Hefti Cast: Robert Redford (Paul Bratter), Jane Fonda (Corie Bratter), Charles Boyer (Victor Velasco), Mildred Natwick (Mrs. Banks), Herb Edelman (Harry Pepper) C-106m. Letterboxed. By Sarah Heiman 10:00 p.m. (ET)/7:00 p.m. (PT) SWEET SMELL OF SUCCESS (1957) Alexander Mackendrick was best known as a director of British comedies (The Man in the White Suit, The Ladykillers) when he was chosen to replace Ernest Lehman as director on Sweet Smell of Success. The result was a visually stunning and hard-edged film noir melodrama which was actually a little too strong for mass audience acceptance in its time. It told the story of J.J. Hunsecker (Burt Lancaster), a powerful and dangerous national columnist who had the power to make and break reputations in his daily newspaper column. It was common knowledge in the entertainment industry that the Hunsecker character was modeled on Walter Winchell who had made his share of enemies during his peak years. The screenplay was inspired by an original story by Ernest Lehman who worked for celebrity press agent Irving Hoffman in Manhattan in the late 1930s. Lehman had ample opportunity to observe the treacherous world of celebrity gossip he was working in and he even supplied Walter Winchell with column "items" on occasion. Due to heath reasons, Lehman, who was serving as director and screenwriter, had to abandon the film production of Sweet Smell of Success in the early stages and MacKendrick took over direction. Clifford Odets was brought in to give the dialogue more punch with street slang and urban New York vernacular. Lancaster, whose production company had optioned Sweet Smell of Success, was considering Orson Welles for the role of Hunsecker when he decided to play the character himself. Compromising himself further, he also began to challenge Alexander MacKendrick's directorial decisions once filming began, a possible result of identitying too closely with the overly manipulative Hunsecker character. Although Lancaster delivered a final cut of the film without Mackendrick's involvement, he soon realized his mistake and called the director back in to fix the ending. The result is without a doubt MacKendrick's most accomplished film and a testiment to his careful rehearsal and elaborate storyboard preparation for the film. Director: Alexander MacKendrick Producer: James Hill Screenplay: Clifford Odets, Ernest Lehman Cinematography: James Wong Howe Music: Elmer Bernstein Editing: Alan Crosland Jr. Art Direction: Edward Carrere Cast: Burt Lancaster (J. J. Hunsecker), Tony Curtis (Sidney Falco), Susan Harrison (Susan Hunsecker), Martin Milner (Steve), Sam Levene (Frank D'Angelo), Barbara Nichols (Rita). BW-97m. Letterboxed. By Jeff Stafford 12:00 a.m. (ET)/9:00 p.m. (PT) THE WRONG MAN (1957) One night in l953, Christopher Emmanuel Balestrero, a bass player at ManhattanÕs Stork Club, was walking home when he was accosted by two policemen. The detectives presented Balestrero to several witnesses who identified him as an armed robber, and soon the hapless musician found himself behind bars. Despite his protests of innocence, he stood trial; though the proceeding resulted in a mistrial, his life became a shambles and his wife snapped under the pressure, eventually being committed to a mental hospital. The police did find the criminal before BalestreroÕs new trial could open, and he was set free, but not before having been put through the machinery of New YorkÕs jail and legal system. Manny BalestreroÕs story caught the eye of Alfred Hitchcock after reading a Life Magazine article, and it immediately appealed to the director. Hitchcock sought out playwright Maxwell Anderson, on the strength of his stage version of The Bad Seed, but the screenplay that Anderson turned in had an oddly detached quality that was at odds with what Hitch was looking for. The director then turned to screenwriter Angus McPhail to fix the various problems with AndersonÕs script. The two proceeded to visit all the locations of the story and the real BalestreroÕs life. In keeping with HitchcockÕs scrupulous attention to detail and verisimilitude, the director sought out the Balestrero familyÕs summer resort in upstate New York, and even OssinningÕs Greenmont Sanitorium, where the poor Rose Balestrero was committed. The final result was a picture that was well outside of the fare that HitchÕs fans were used to. The Wrong Man (1957) featured no suspenseful chases, no cliffhanger action segments, and not even any of HitchcockÕs trademark comic relief. Instead, it took a semi-documentary approach, with Henry Fonda as the bewildered Manny, and Vera Miles as his high-strung, long-suffering wife. Its stark black-and-white look even dispensed with many of HitchÕs stylistic trademarks, opting for a nearly newsreel-style authenticity. The result was a movie that was a hit with audiences, but the fact that it was a true story, combined with its subdued tone, made it one of the directorÕs more subtly terrifying films. Surprisingly, critical reception was lukewarm. The New York TimesÕ A.H. Weiler noted, "Frighteningly authentic, the story generates only a modicum of drama", and described FondaÕs performance as "disquietingly even". Nonetheless, The Wrong Man is an harrowing film made all the more unnerving by the fact that a quirk of fate could land the viewer in the same predicament as Manny Balestrero. Director: Alfred Hitchcock Producer: Alfred Hitchcock, Herbert Coleman (associate) Screenplay: Maxwell Anderson, Angus MacPhail Cinematography: Robert Burks Music: Bernard Herrmann Art Direction: Paul Sylbert Principle Cast: Henry Fonda (Manny Balestrero), Vera Miles (Rose Balestrero), Anthony Quayle (Frank OÕConnor), Harold Stone (Lt. Bowers), John Heldabrand (Tomasini), Doreen Lang (Ann James) BW-106m. By Jerry Renshaw 2:00 a.m. (ET)/11:00 p.m. (PT) ALL FALL DOWN (1962) Virtually ignored by the public when it was released in 1962, All Fall Down (1962) is a finely etched portrait of Berry-Berry Willart (Warren Beatty), an irresponsible ladies' man whose hedonistic lifestyle and aimless drifting creates a family crisis when he visits his family in Cleveland. Although he is idolized by his younger brother, Clinton (Brandon de Wilde), the infatuation ends when Berry-Berry takes advantage of a vulnerable, older woman (Eva Marie Saint), exposing his true nature. 1962 proved to be a banner year for director John Frankenheimer. Following The Young Savages (1961), he was offered a choice of properties to direct. One was Irwin Shaw's Two Weeks in Another Town (which eventually went to Vincente Minnelli) and a novella by James Leo Herlihy called All Fall Down. The playwright William Inge (Picnic) adapted the latter for executive producer John Houseman and Frankenheimer eagerly agreed to do it in-between post-production on Birdman of Alcatraz and preparation for The Manchurian Candidate, both of which were released the same year to unanimous critical acclaim. In The Cinema of John Frankenheimer by Gerald Pratley, the director comments on the filming of All Fall Down: "The only thing I didn't like was the insistence of MGM that we had to do the interiors and the mid-Western part of it at the studio, to use their back lot; and as John Houseman had agreed to that there was really nothing I could do because we did need four seasons. We needed that seasonal change and they could do this artificially in the studio...If I'd known then what I know now we would have shot it on location. But I didn't. The best part of the film was the location part in Key West. I had a terrific fight with MGM who wanted to shoot the inside of the bus in process and I said, 'There's no way.' You can tell the difference. And how. In reality there was a whole scene that took place inside the bus that we had to cut out. It just didn't play." According to John Houseman, it was William Inge who suggested Warren Beatty for the role of Berry-Berry and while it remains one of Beatty's finest performances, the rising young star created considerable tension on the set. In his autobiography, Final Dress, Houseman said, "From the start, our most serious problem was young Mr. Beatty. With his angelic arrogance, his determination to emulate Marlon Brando and Jimmy Dean, and his half-baked, overzealous notions of "Method" acting, he succeeded in perplexing and antagonizing not only his fellow actors, but our entire crew. While the company was on location in Key West, our veteran cameraman, Curly Lindon, became so exasperated with him that he flew a camera-bearing helicopter within a few inches of his head. And on the last day of shooting, in a secret agreement with the local police, Warren Beatty was left to languish overnight in a bare cell of the Key West jail while the company flew back to California." While Houseman also criticized MGM for the inept marketing and distribution of All Fall Down, he remained fond of the film: "Two of my films that I often find myself bracketing (although they were made more than a dozen years apart) are All Fall Down and They Live By Night (1949). Both were modest, adventurous, emotional films about young people made by young directors at the start of their careers." Director: John Frankenheimer Producer: John Houseman, Ethel Winant (associate) Screenplay: James Leo Herlihy (novel), William Inge Cinematography: Lionel Lindon Music: Alex North Art Direction: E. Preston Ames, George W. Davis Principle Cast: Eva Marie Saint (Echo OÕBrien), Warren Beatty (Berry-Berry Willart), Karl Malden (Ralph Willart), Angela Lansbury (Annabell Willart), Brandon De Wilde (Clinton Willart) BW-111m. Letterboxed. Closed captioning. By Jeff Stafford 4:00 a.m. (ET)/1:00 a.m. (PT) ROOM SERVICE (1938) The only motion picture the Marx Brothers made for RKO Studios has the distinction of also being the only film they made that was not originally created for them. Their earliest work at Paramount, The Cocoanuts (1929) and Animal Crackers (1930), were based on their hit Broadway shows. Their next five pictures were written for the screen specifically for them. Room Service, however, was taken from a popular Broadway farce by Allen Boretz and John Murray and adapted for film by Morrie Ryskind, himself a Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright and the man who penned three other Marx Brothers comedies. The more purist fans of the zany quartet (by this time a trio, after the departure of Zeppo) find this outing a little disappointing. After all, Harpo doesnÕt play harp, Chico doesnÕt play piano, and there is only one song and no Margaret Dumont. But the brothers are still in rare form. The story finds Groucho, Chico and Harpo holed up in a hotel, waiting for financing for a new Broadway show theyÕre trying to produce. The room, already packed with members of the cast, fills up with each new arrival as the boys struggle to buy time and avoid eviction. Because the original play was such a hit, Ryskind was under orders from RKO not to change too much. In fact, the most significant alteration was the removal of the word "God" from the stage script. The play Groucho (in the role of producer Gordon Miller) is sponsoring is called Hail and Farewell instead of Godspeed, and, in keeping with the motion picture code of the time, even the mildest expletives were toned down. But the Marx Brothers-inspired lunacy breaks through even the most restrictive conventions, as when Groucho moves with his trademark loping walk across the hotel lobby or Chico responds with characteristic bluntness to a man asking for time to wash up: "The rest of us are washed up already." Harpo, typically mute in what was a minor speaking part in the play, contributes his brand of whirlwind pantomime in dining scenes as a man with an impossibly ravenous appetite. In other words, although it was the first box office disappointment for the boys, itÕs still the Marx Brothers, and thatÕs always worth several viewings to catch everything thatÕs going on. The picture is also worth catching for an early performance by a future comedy legend Ñ Lucille Ball. Then a contract player for RKO, Ball had made a minor name for herself as a second-string player in films like Stage Door (1937), which was also adapted by Ryskind from a hit play. Although you canÕt tell from their screen time together, Ball didnÕt like the Marx Brothers very much, according to her biographer Kathleen Brady. Maybe she just didnÕt appreciate their anarchistic backstage antics. One day the brothers learned there were to be visitors to what they had requested should be a closed set, so they planned a vengeful antic. The scene scheduled for shooting called for Lucy to run into a room, close the door, and keep going, with the Marx Brothers in hot pursuit. But the trio stripped, burst through the door and pursued her in the nude, shocking the visitors, who just happened to be priests and nuns. The only Marx Brother Ball liked was Harpo, who she considered a gentleman and far less manic than the others in private. Years later, when she was a major television star of the 1950s and the brothersÕ film career had ended, Harpo was a guest on I Love Lucy. Dressed identically in the Harpo character costume, the two performed a mirror routine that has become almost as famous as the one Harpo and Groucho immortalized 20 years earlier in the cult classic, Duck Soup (1933). Director: William A. Seiter Producer: Pandro S. Berman Screenplay: Morrie Ryskind Cinematography: J. Roy Hunt Art Direction: Van Nest Polglase, Al Herman Music: Roy Webb Cast: Groucho Marx (Gordon Miller), Chico Marx (Harry Binelli), Harper Marx (Faker Englund), Lucille Ball (Christine), Ann Miller (Hilda Manney), Frank Albertson (Leo Davis) By Rob Nixon